SXSW is headed in a growth direction

Come Wednesday, when some of the most celebrated names in pop music history gather in New York for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s annual induction ceremony, a large segment of the music industry will be settling into the Lone Star State for an annual affair that aims to shine a light on music’s future hall of famers.

The 19th annual South by Southwest Music Conference got underway Friday in Austin with low-key seminars, film screenings, panel discussions and a trade show.

Things really start heating up Wednesday, when it can seem as if the whole city is jumping to the strains of rock, hip-hop, Tex-Mex, R&B;, blues, soul, rock en espanol, funk, folk, country and beyond with hundreds of music showcases running from dawn till dawn.

Billboard magazine has described SXSW as “a veritable fantasyland for music fans.... A nearly 24-hour-a-day onslaught of live music showcases, parties and panels, as well as a whiplash-inducing propensity to run into other journalists, publicists, long-lost friends.”

This year’s keynote speaker might be better described as the keynote shrieker: Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant will address convention-goers Saturday morning, although he hasn’t told festival organizers what topic he’ll address.

Participation has grown steadily each year. Last year some 1,200 acts appeared at SXSW in hopes of attracting the attention of some of the 8,000 record and radio executives, managers, journalists and just plain fans.

As of Friday, the tally on bands and solo performers at this year’s festival had topped 1,300 -- selected by a screening committee from more than 7,000 applicants -- raising the question: Is this too much of a good thing?

“It seems pretty hectic right now,” a festival spokeswoman said Friday, “but once it’s over, we’re always glad we had everyone come.”

One new element this year will make at least a glimmer of the festival available to those who can’t make the pilgrimage to Austin. The event’s website, 2005.sxsw.com, has been upgraded to allow continuous streaming of songs from the acts on this year’s lineup. It also provides details about where and when each will play during the fest and includes links to artists’ websites.

Website visitors also can quickly call up any act they want to sample, including alt-rock group the Be Good Tanyas, ex-Blur singer Graham Coxon, singer-songwriter Mary Gauthier, and Amos Lee, the highly touted opener on the Bob Dylan-Merle Haggard tour.

Since 1994, an increasingly important part of SXSW has been its film festival component, which aims to add a Sundance-like glow to Austin with screenings of independent films, many of which have their public premieres there.